The WaPo whopper on Pulitzer mess

Confederate Yankee:

Today’s Washington Post editorial Bad Targeting was probably left unsigned with the primary goal of protecting the reputation of the wretch assigned to excrete it. You can hardly blame them. If a name were ever assigned to this dunghill of journalistic excuses, the author would forever lose what credibility he or she retains.

The Post sticks with septic certainty to its allegation that the United States has (or had) secret prisons in Europe, even after investigation have found no proof of illegal renditions, and no proof that such prisons ever existed. None.

The Post then has the audacity accuse CIA Director Porter Goss of a "questionable use" his authority, for firing an employee who concealed multiple instances of certainly unethical and possibly illegal acts. "Questionable use?" Brassy words coming from the newspaper that used its bully pulpit to release approximately three hundred articles and editorials on "Plamegate" with many of those calling for Karl Rove’s head, with no actual evidence of wrong-doing.

But the most pathetic defense of all that the Post tries to mount is to suggest that Mary McCarthy had multiple illicit contacts with the press out of some sense of patriotism. They would spin this to suggest that Mary McCarthy, who worked in the Inspector General’s Office of the Central Intelligence Agency, was unaware of the very real and legal options she would have had under federal whistleblower statutes, specifically the Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act of 1998. Knowing the intricacies of such laws and the minutia of internal CIA policies regarding the same are among the responsibilities of her office.

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Andrew McCarthy also finds little to find in high regard about the editorial:

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I think the WPost editors are sprinkling LSD on their Cheerios. Take this part (and, yes, I realize this is fishing in a barrel) (italics and other modifications are mine):

Maybe [MAYBE?!?] disclosure of the prisons damaged national security -- the CIA has offered no evidence of that -- but it's hard to imagine what could be more damaging than the existence of the system itself.

1. So, it's not enough that the war effort be undermined. It's now incumbent on the CIA to explain in detail to al Qaeda -- through the pages of the WPost of course -- how classified disclosures have damaged our attempts to defeat them?

2. So, if we are unable to keep the Khalid Sheik Mohammeds isolated until they talk to us, and they therefore don't tell us about a plot we would otherwise have learned of, and thus an avoidable bombing of, say, downtown Washington happens, the WPost finds it "hard to imagine" how that could be more damaging to our country than the isolation program itself?

Next best part: the WPost's indignation in summation over "CIA personnel [who] ... played a part in the failure to prevent the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001." Perfect! -- do everything you can to make it impossible for us to get intelligence and then prattle about intelligence failure!

I now think I've been all wrong about this. The Justice Department shouldn't bother with prosecution for the publication of defense secrets. It appears the press has a bullet-proof insanity defense.

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You would think that an organization that makes it money by putting words together and communicating could do a better job of explaining why we should publish information that will help the enemy. While I don't think I could, explain it either, that should have been a good reason for not doing it to begin with.